It's been almost five years since Disney+ ruined the dreams of every millennial and canceled the in-progress Lizzie McGuire revival series. Disney+ had used the revival as an early promise and draw alongside the launch of the streaming service in 2019. Production on the revival began in October 2019, but by January 2020, the series had already run into turmoil that would be its downfall.
Lizzie McGuire star Jake Thomas recently caught up with E! News and was asked about the revival series that never was. Seeing as Hilary Duff has rarely spoken about the revival since its dissolution, Thomas' comments are welcome insight into what went wrong. The actor chalks up the show's unfortunate cancellation to something that "just happens" and "bad timing" with COVID:
"We actually filmed two episodes of the reboot that unfortunately, it fell apart. Sometimes that just happens. It was bad timing with everything. It was right at the beginning of COVID, and it just kinda fell apart. But yeah, I was really excited to see where Matt was going to be today and, more importantly, for audiences to see that." —Jake Thomas
He's not wrong that COVID certainly didn't help the revival's case, but Thomas shares some rather diplomatic responses about what went wrong with Lizzie McGuire 2.0 all those years ago. "Bad timing?" More like bad decision-making on Disney's part! It's widely known that creator Terri Minsky left as showrunner shortly into production due to creative differences. Not too long after, the show completely shut down because of those creative differences.
When all of this was happening in February 2020, Duff publicly petitioned for Disney to move the revival from Disney+ to Hulu in order for the mature themes to not be sacrificed. She and Minsky had a vision to accurately depict 30-year-old Lizzie as she is without giving it an overly family-friendly sheen that didn't make sense. The series remained in development until it was ultimately scrapped altogether by Disney in December 2020, which Duff announced herself directly to fans.
It's a deeply frustrating irony now given that Disney+ has been regularly producing and distributing original and acquired series and movies with themes and subject matter much more mature than whatever Lizzie had going on. We can give them a little benefit of the doubt since the platform's launch rested on being family-friendly, a hub for all things Disney. Now, the streaming service has largely combined with Hulu anyway and houses all kinds of TV-MA programming.
In 2024, Lizzie McGuire revival writer Jonathan Hurwitz went viral on TikTok for posting a series of videos that revealed what would have happened in the series. He shared the plots for the first two episodes, which were filmed, and teased some of the script for the third episode along with additional details from future episodes. Lizzie would have opened episode 3 in Ethan Craft's bed and her animated alter ego would have suggested they had sex twice. Oh, the horror!
Five years later, it's still a shame that Disney+ didn't take the risk on what would have been a massive hit series. There's no way around it; the revival would have been huge and exactly what the fans who grew up with the character wanted. Duff later went on to star in Hulu's How I Met Your Mother offshoot How I Met Your Father, which was canceled on a cliffhanger after two seasons. Disney sure has an odd way of working with a true icon of its brand. Hilary Duff deserved a lot better in both instances.
Lizzie McGuire and its movie are available to stream on Disney+.